The Story of Alchemy. By M. M. Pattison Muir, M.A.
(G. Newnes. 1s.)—Mr. Muir adds to his title "and the Beginnings of Chemistry," words which help us to understand the way in which he regards his subject. "We should never forget," he writes, "that the alchemists were patient and laborious workers, their theories were vitally connected with their practice, and there was a constant action and reaction between their general scheme of things and many branches of what we now call chemical manu- factures." Boyle humorously said that they were like Solomon's navigators, who brought back not only gold, silver, and ivory, but apes and peacocks ; but they were pioneers. In every branch of human knowledge and action beginnings which we are often tempted to despise and ridicule had to be. Mr. Muir is a present- day man of science, but he knows too much not to appreciate those who have gone before him. This is an excellent little book. There is a laps= calami in the date of Lucretius, who was not "born at the end of the first century of our era."
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